I didn't know people still relied on TripAdvisor lol.

I don't "rely on" TA but their forums are much more active for the places I visit than here on Fodor's. I use their Destination Forums... not reviews, booking, or anything else. I can get an answer 5x over before I even get one here on Fodor's.

Blaire I still use TA and many other sites.. I have traveled to about 18-20 countries ( not many compared to others I know) and have used TA for at least the last 15 yrs.. so not sure what you meant by "still".. the trip reports and reviews are always pretty current.

I have booked dozens of hotels , flights, train trips etc etc .. using TA as a resource for reveiws and the forums on it for advice and information.

I also use several other websites.

I wanted to use it for forum purposes but that's not available. More importantly, it doesn't appear to do anything about actually advising people on how to get the most out of trips.

Why do you think the forum is not available , it certainly is , I was just on it ten minutes ago ?

I agree with thursdaysd and suze. I use the forums a lot to seek information from other travellers. I avoid the obviously fake reviews and the useless (often from India) vacuous comments. I agree with Marlborough - " Another bugbear are those people who post simply for posting sake with nothing valuable or constructive to say, simply to increase their points." I seek out a poster who obviously has knowledge and PM them with specific questions.

The reviews of properties and restaurants, I take with a pinch of salt and do as thrusdaysd does - review them on other rating sites. TA's rating system really needs an overhaul. In one particular case a hotel we stayed at in Jaipur was rated highly and by chance I knew a relative of the owner (but not before we booked). The room we got was old and mouldy and the fly wire screen had so many holes in it that we might as well have left it open for the amount of mosquitos it let in. The food was not great and the staff tried hard but were not trained at all. Because the owner was a formal naval officer he was impressed by my father's military status and the fact that I knew a relative of his and tried to include us in family events but late at night when we would like to hit the hay after a long hot day of sightseeing.

I contacted TA and complained about the rating that had been given but they merely said it was on the number of comments made not by real knowledge of the property. They were not interested in my photographs which showed that it was not even a two star let alone a four or five star property. After that I was a lot wiser and looked at a lot of other sites to confirm whether I wanted to stay at any particular property.

In relation to photographs TA refused some of my photographs on the grounds that they do not post out of focus photographs (OK) although my photographs were not out of focus and spot on the issues they intended to highlight. Looking at other poster's photographs, the mind boggles as to TA's view of what is out of focus or relevant. When one wants to check photographs of rooms and bathrooms, one does not want to see someone's holiday snaps or their cute children, yet these are in abundance and one has to trawl through dreadful and irrelevant photographs to find what you want.

When a property closes or has an issue which means it is temporarily closed, even when TA users indicate this has happened, TA continues to allow out of date properties to surface.

I often trawl through reviews and don't just rely on current reviews but look back at what other people through at a particular time and ask them questions too.

Yes, since one cannot contact a Fodorite directly one has to rely on a poster looking at past posts to answer any questions one may have posted. Also Fodor does not provide the facility to post photographs.

Rasputin1: >>Yes, since one cannot contact a Fodorite directly one has to rely on a poster looking at past posts to answer any questions one may have posted<<

When Fodors changes to the new platform/format (delayed again apparently but probably w/i the next couple of months) P-M's will be possible here - though I understand one will be able to opt out.

<forum purposes but that's not available. More importantly, it doesn't appear to do anything about actually advising people on how to get the most out of trips>

There are Destination Forums for each specific city, region, country.

You post questions and people answer them. That how you get advice on "how to get the most out of trips".

The information isn't coming from corporate Trip Advisor in the forums, it's from your fellow posters, just like here on Fodor's.

"P-M's will be possible here - though I understand one will be able to opt out."

The trouble with PMs is that only one person gets the value of any answer. If I don't turn PMs off altogether, I will probably post my answers on the relevant threads.

>>The trouble with PMs is that only one person gets the value of any answer.<<

I totally agree thursdaysd . . . I was just letting rasputin know one of the features he seems to like about TA will be coming here.

I answer a lot of PMs on Trip Advisor.

They are questions that are not relevant to the general thread, or for whatever reason the person is shy about posting publicly.

I'm happy to help people one-on-one.

Why would accumulating points matter.. they have zero value?

Fodor's is slow these days, and I am hardly getting any answers, while on TA they are fast and sufficient.

Exactly. I've tested it :-)

Dayenu.. its true I get more answers , and for more obscure places on trip advisor than any other forum.. more locals and expats on them is one reason I think, they know the bus schedule for Morlay etc .

Well there aren't so many locals left in paris forum after they expelled so many INC our good friend Seanbee.

Several people here have mentioned the Destinations section of TA. Can anyone tell me how to find that? Is it actually called Destinations? I only see something called Things To Do.

Goddesstogo- I think it just refers to the subsections in the forums. Like for France you can view all of the France questions, or you can go to the Paris sub forum and just view the Paris questions. If you post a Paris question in the general France forum, someone will come along to bug you to post it in the Paris sub forum. I believe the sub forums have a menu on the computer page- I usually use my mobile, which lacks several of the TA tabs.

It's one of those things I hate and like about TA. It results in too much cross posting and makes it difficult to get more interesting questions. But on the other hand, it makes it easier to find answers too- if you are hunting for Albany threads, it means you can just look at the two pages of threads this year on Albany and not sort through the gajillion pages of questions on how to buy tickets for Statue of Liberty and Hamilton.

I wish fodors allowed photo posting. But honestly I don't find the PM function or sub forums useful in trip planning. I get chatty pms on TA; those I like. I get the occasional specific question, and thank you- I'm happy to help. But it's more often stuff that is redundant or pointless. People have better chance of me responding to a thread than a PM. I forget and the notification gets buried in my email half the time.

TA is generally a better place to find nitty gritty details. And I feel like it's a place to find more of a variety of people. Fodors tends to skew towards well heeled and older. TA tends to skew more towards the bargain hunter and kid friendly. The stuff that Rasputin mentions- a lot of it is due to price and perceived value. You've got to look at the reviews to figure out if the five star reviews are coming from frequent travelers with champagne tastes, or from hicks who consider red lobster and the best western living the good life. Not sure how he expects TA to fix the rating issue. Both views are equally valid. The example he cited- I mean, I'd believe his account of the ill repair and lack of trained staff. But I could stay at the same property, and for the right price, I wouldn't care about the screens or staff, and I'd find the owner's friendliness a boon. Not a TA problem. I'm surprised they gave any criteria for photos but I don't look at review photos anyway.

Oh, thanks, mm.

goddesstogo,
Along the top of the page to the right of "things to do" are three dots. Click on those and you will see travel forums in the drop down menu. That's where all the discussions take place. Lots of good information there.

Thanks so much, schmerl!

schmerl's way is more direct I guess but you can also put in the destination name, for example "Honolulu". Then under "About Honolulu" there's a drop down menu that starts with:

Honolulu Touristm
Honolulu Hotels
etc. etc.
Honolulu Travel Forum (is about half way down & click on that)

Good. Thanks!

Tripadvisor faults
 

I agree with some of the remarkd, there isn’t enough differenciation between types of user. I usually don’t use Tripadvisor to find what I want, but I post to help other travelers by trying to give a clear idea from my persepective as someone that travels the world 6 months a year for over 30 years. I post on cafés up to 3 star restaurants and 7 star hotels. I don’t like that Tripadvisor can’t be contacted and that you must write 200 characters when there isn’t that much to right. They say they believe in the right to right, but they obviously don’t. They make money on our posts and then force you to write more than you want to write

Nope, no one can "force" you to write anything on Trip Advisor -lol!

200 characters
 

I didn’t have enough to say about a place but Tripadvisor wanted 200 characters so I finished my post with ‘can’t get to 200 characters and they refused to publish with the the statement about protecting the right to write which I think is hypocritical, but I found it impossible to find a way of writing an e-mail to them or a simple comment form! A one way system!

Just post your "reviews" in the Destination Forums rather than the official review section. There's no rules about how long posts need to be there. More freedom to say what you want to say as well.

I use TA for every trip I take, but with a practiced eye. I read hotel reviews and generally throw out the horrible and the fantastic, unless there's enough of either to make it a trend. I pay attention to why people give a place poor ratings ("they wouldn't give me a free cannoli even though I referred four couples to them the day before"). I also cross-reference TA reviews with reviews on other sites - I'm a spreadsheet nerd. I don't generally bother with restaurant reviews, since food is so subjective. I look at the attractions and their reviews, to get a lay of the land, so to speak, but don't generally care what something is ranked at. And I peruse the destination forums, but tend to pore over them first to get a feel for the atmosphere and any prejudices the DEs may have.

I post reviews myself on almost everything after a trip, and I'm careful to note if something sucked or was great due just my idiosyncrasies, and not necessarily a reflection on the establishment, and rate accordingly. But still, I mention it, because someone else may have the very same idiosyncrasy or need. I think in all my hotel reviews, I've given one absolute rave and one horrible "run from this place."

You can click on any other Trip Advisor members profile and see their posting history. That's very handy in judging reviews.

I like trip advisor. You can't believe everything you read on any forum. People here will tell you they don't like Dublin where I love the place. I am glad I didn't follow all the post here or there about which champagne tour to take in Reims yesterday. I enjoyed the one we took so much because of the historic caves. Someone told me to go to St Remi on another travel site and we were so happy we did not miss that gem. I love many of the posters on TA, very nice and not so much snark. Snowing here in France so in for the night but had a wonderful day driving the country visiting WW1 historical sights. Staying at the best place in Verdun. letempleverdun.com I have never slept in a church but will be tonight.

the trail has gone cold
 

My only comment was I don’t like my post being refused with less than 200 characters and one can’t contact them: such an arrogant stance! As for all the rest it’s obvious isn’t it? Champagne and all the Roman caves, Verdun the Ossuaire, the fortress, the villages that are no more etc etc. So sad, millions died. The valley where Patton first saw service, the village wherr he’s buried, not to mention Bastogne, the Maginot line....so much to see on the WW1 and 2 trail,

Personally, I had good experience with Trip Advisor Forums. I asked for hangout spot suggestions in Dubai before I moved to Dubai and I got a useful response.

I do spend a little time catching up on a few Trip Advisor forums, until Fodor's it's been the only forum that I've utilized. I think the info is often good real time stuff.


But Trip Advisor has it's problems. There is arguing, poorly texted posts, and a few posters who post ad nauseum all day long cluttering some of the forums until everybody is sick of them and they don't get why, not to mention people who don't know how to use paragraphs. So if you can sift past those, you can get some good information.

So much for TA's role as trip "advisor":

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/14/t...criticism.html

Boots

That link is old. TA made a significant change in their policies on reporting negative issues since (and because of) that report.